to the dance of life
I can’t put my finger on it quite yet, but something compells me to come back to this piece. It’s not flashy, like watching Ed Harris re-enact a Pollock creation. Perhaps it’s the meditative quality or the improvisational nature as Susie Ibarra and Makoto Fujimura influence one another.
Whatever it is, it’s beautiful:
A few days ago (meaning sometime in January, February, or perhaps March), I sat down with Josh Havens, lead singer of the Dove Award-winning band, The Afters (as well as guitar and keyboards) and apparently Coffee Master, and talked about music.
This podcast is Part One of that interview, where we discuss how Starbucks is working toward Total World Domination in good ways.
Please ignore the incessant dog barking. Also the fact that we decided to have the interview outside with no outside lighting at night. I promise that is, indeed, Josh Havens.
Also, you can subscribe to these podcasts (and more!) through Blip.TV or through iTunes. Rumor has it the audio-only (mp3) version is floating around in cyberworld (on iTunes, I believe), but I have no idea how to get it on this post.
Psst–If you find this post interesting and think others might as well, would you mind taking a minute to stumble it? It would mean a lot to me.
Refractions: A Journey of Faith, Art, and Culture collects essays written by Makoto Fujimura to artists from 2004 to 2006. Living in post-9/11 New York City, Fujimura challenges artists: How does your art recognize the brokenness around you? How does your art offer hope and redemption in the midst of it?
I began this book months ago. The essays demand to be read contemplatively, even devotionally. I savored it morsel by morsel, letting each piece roll on my tongue, slide down my throat. As I digested it, it became part of me and part of my art.
Makoto leads artists toward art that recovers dignity and beauty without becoming sentimental or ignoring the hurt and brokeness of the world. In fact, the path toward beauty moves through brokenness.
He encourages artists to take the long view of their art in a time when fifteen minutes of fame, instant recognition, and "[peddling] our goods to find significance and survival" rule the art world. "Artists who labor to develop their craft, artists who are committed to a longer view of their art, suffer" (p. 142). But our art isn’t for fame, recognition or even significance. It’s to glorify God and offer a sacrament to this world. It is to bring God’s power of resurrection to the dead.
To do this, artists need the Church to invest in them spiritually and artistically. They need the Church to walk alongside them, to hold them up, even, to support them (emotionally, spiritually, and financially). Fujimura calls for an expanded role for the Church–not just appreciating the arts and using them in their worship (although these things are good), but to train artists and encourage them.
Fujimura’s writing awakens hope for the discouraged artist. And who among us is not or has not been discouraged? I read this at a time where I realized I had a choice: to take the easier (although not easy) and marketable road of art or to take the longer, sufferable road.
I choose the longer road.
Psst—If you find this post interesting and think others might as well, would you mind taking a minute to stumble it? It would mean a lot to me.
I read this the other day on Pandora about Bobby Darin:
“There’s been considerable discussion about whether
Bobby Darin should be classified as a rock & roll singer, a Vegas
hipster cat, an interpreter of popular standards, or even a
folk-rocker. He was all of these and none of these. Throughout his
career he made a point of not becoming committed to any one style at
the exclusion of others; at the height of his nightclub fame he
incorporated a folk set into his act. When it appeared he could have
gone on indefinitely as a sort of junior version of Frank Sinatra, he would periodically record pop/rock and folk-rock singles whose principal appeal lay outside of the adult pop market . . . It may be most accurate to say that Darin was, above all, a singer
who wanted to do a lot of things, rather than make his mark as a
particular stylist. That may have cost him some points as far as making
it to the very top of certain genres, but also makes his work more
versatile than almost any other vocalist of his era.”
Psst–If you find this post interesting and think others might as well, would you mind taking a minute to stumble it? It would mean a lot to me.
This is the third and final installment of my talk with Sandra Glahn.
Sandra Glahn is the author of fiction (including a Christy-nominated
book), nonfiction, and Bible studies. She’s editor of the award-winning
magazine, Kindred Spirit, and adjunct professor at Dallas Theological Seminary. You can learn more about Sandi and her writing at her website and at her blog.
In
this podcast, we talk about subjective and objective standards of art,
how Christians should interact with art both in responding and creating. (Hint: it requires sophistication.)
(If you missed parts one and two, I highly recommend catching up: good thoughts on the power of story.)
For more on this subject, I recommend Daniel Siedell’s book God in the Gallery: A Christian Embrace of Modern Art (Cultural Exegesis)
Psst–If you find this post interesting and think others might as well, would you mind taking a minute to stumble it? It would mean a lot to me.
A little boy in the pew in front of me on Sunday studied something behind me. Then he knelt at the pew and drew a couple of seconds. He stood again–he was no higher than the back of the pew–and studied. He studied more than he drew. I couldn’t see his work, but I knew.
This was an artist.
Soon, his mother, probably afraid he was distracting other worshipers, told him to sit down.
"But I need to see that," he whispered. He didn’t whine. This was a matter of fact.
She shushed him and sat him down. I was tempted to tell her that he needed to draw what he saw and that he needed to see what he wanted to draw. I wanted to tell her that this is how he understands God.
I’m not saying that artists are more important than other worshipers. I’m not saying that artists should find an identity in art rather than in God. I’m not arguing for free-reign to do whatever we want because, after all, we’re artists.
But all people need freedom, guided by Scripture, the Holy Spirit, and the universal church, as they approach God.
Psst–If you find this post interesting and think others might as well, would you mind taking a minute to stumble it? It would mean a lot to me.
This is the final installment of my interview with Dr. Reg Grant, professor at Dallas Theological Seminary, actor, author, and tap dancer. In this podcast, we talk about the artist, depression, and the pursuit of joy.
(To enter February’s Artuality on furniture, click here.)
In this podcast, we explore two ideas of being a Christian in the art
world: (1) seeing beauty and truth in art created by Christians and non-Christians alike and (2)
pursuing excellence in our craft because we are Christians.
Theologian Alexander Scmemann said that Christians see Christ everywhere (as quoted in God in the Gallery by Siedell). Because of the Imago Dei and because of God’s desire to reveal his beauty, we can taste it from so many sources–though the sources may come from non-Christians.
But as Christians, and in this case, specifically as artists, we must also take seriously our call to image beauty and truth with excellence. Just because we are Christians does not make our art acceptable. Just as accountants must work to have correct numbers and teachers must work to clearly communicate, artists must pursue their field with excellence. This means both working on the craft itself as well as the theology, philosophy, and ideas of beauty that become art.
It’s been a while since I’ve posted a video blog/podcast. Here’s the next in the series of conversations with Dr. Reg Grant.
In this episode, he compares acting to Christianity.
The podcast is under five minutes
In this podcast, I speak with Dr. Reg Grant, professor at Dallas
Theological Seminary, published novelist, actor, and apparently
tap-dancer. We discuss a healthy artistic life and the formation and
transformation of the artist.
Dr. Grant says something that reminds me of C.S. Lewis, who, in Mere Christianity, said we must lose ourselves and be in Christ, but instead of this making us all the same, "the more truly ourselves we become…There is so much of Him that millions and millions of ‘little Christs,’ all different, will still be too few to express Him fully" (p. 189). The only real personalities exist in God, but we can’t go to him in order to pursue ourselves. Our real selves come when we’re looking for him. "Look for yourself, and you will find in the long run only hatred, loneliness, despair, rage, ruin, and decay. But look for Christ and you will find Him, and with Him everything else thrown in" (p. 190).
I think this applies to our art. The fullness of our creativity can only be found in Christ. This is not to say that unbelievers can’t make beautiful art, but that as Christians fully pursuing Christ, we find our art fuller, more able to express him. But if I pursue Christ for the sake of my art, I’ll find only emptiness.
This podcast segment is 7 minutes.
I tell tales--tall ones, short ones, fat ones, skinny ones. Some call it compulsive lying. I call it writing.
